Sunday, 1 July 2012

I think it is time for an update on some
previous posts about the quinta, and to add a few random thoughts. I do hope
that what I post makes readers think about their own situation and land rather
than people feel I am giving out instructions, or merely reporting on
happenings on the property. It is wrong to attempt to dictate to people about
the way they live their own lives, but relevant reading that leads to a
stimulation of the mind is different. I have always read as much as possible
about gardening and farming around the world and I continue to do so. It is
impossible to know everything that might be suitable for the use of your land,
but I try to keep learning through reading.

I planted up the extra olive trees as
planned and we now have 483. Most of them are not yet bearing fruit, but those
that are have just completed flowering. According to the Ag. Dept. flowering
was very variable across this part of Portugal this year, with some flowering
well, and others very sparsely. My own trees show similar variances, with some
that I had expected to flower in abundance only showing a few. It seems the
extremely dry winter was part of the problem, and I have seen a suggestion from
a bloke in England that I know only by the name of Owd Fred, that a similarly
dry winter is the cause of spasmodic flowering of apple trees this year too.
The older olive trees that I retained have all flowered very well, and it
suggests that they were able to extract sufficient moisture from their bigger
root system, but they are all in favourable positions too and consistently bear
well, and that is why they were retained.

Another problem was that Spring never did
spring. It is a short season here anyway but this year we went straight from
Winter to Summer. April was a full 5ºC cooler than last year and we had
overnight temperatures just above freezing, with only 5º as late as 1st
May. Then it began to rain – very late, but most welcome, in fact essential to
avert a disaster for many people. 110mm were recorded and we needed every one
of them. Areas nearer the west coast continued to receive more, and I am sure
they needed that too. As soon as the rain stopped the temperatures increased to
around the 30ºC mark and remained there until St John’s Day (celebrated
overnight on 23to 24 June in Porto and other places as well as other countries,
especially I am told, Estonia)) when it moved into the high 30s. The overnight
minimum on 26th June was a new record high of 23º and the soil
temperature at 9.30 a.m. next morning a similar record at 26º. I know that
farmers across Britain were complaining at the same time about excessive rain.
Perhaps that is going to be a feature of weather patterns for Britain. A few
years back some climate forecasters were predicting more extremes of
temperatures and rain in future.

It is much easier to cope with wet weather and
even temporary waterlogging or flooding, than it is to farm or garden through a
very long dry spell (such as we experience every year in the Iberian Peninsula,
and elsewhere, of course) and real drought conditions as occur in Australia,
parts of the USA, Africa and other places, often mean just waiting it out
without hope of doing anything practical. I appreciate crops can be lost
through wet weather close to harvest, and I had a total wipe out of over 200
acres of millet due to excess rain one year in Australia, but pastures grow in
extreme wet, and not in extremely dry times.

I decided not to grow more loofahs this year.
It was an interesting crop to grow, but the preparation of the matured fruit to
bathroom loofah is quite labour intensive. We gave a few to friends and
relatives – some of whom had previously thought they were a marine creature
rather like a sponge. I did keep back some peanuts from last year’s harvest,
and they are growing well in one of the garden beds. My “grown from seed” apple
trees are carrying a good crop too, as are the commercial ones we already had
growing. Previous severe crop losses of these, and pulses in the garden,
through insect damage; inedible grapes through fungal diseases, resulting in no
wine either; and a take over of weeds and fungal problems in agricultural crops
has led me to abandon all thoughts of continuing to avoid the use of sprays.
Portugal is definitely not an easy area to attempt to be organic. Hard winters
and a good growing summer season make life much easier for organic production.

Apart from flat out irrigating, my main job at
present is picking the hectare of White Lupins. This is another crop I will not
be growing again on a field scale. They grew well despite the lack of winter
rain, but I would say a combine harvester is essential for larger scale
growing. It is harvested too late to be following on with a summer crop and
they are quite difficult to remove from the plant - bunches of pods needing to
be cut off with secateurs. As previously posted the pods have very sharp points,
making the wearing of leather gloves essential. They are also difficult to
shell, but I have a fairly labour intensive method of overcoming this that
would work well with other podded vegetables, but only if you have hot dry
weather, a polytunnel or greenhouse. I lay the pods on the tarmac entrance road
to the house after picking and after a week or so they dry enough to burst
open. Being big seeds they do not fly when the pod bursts, just drop to the
ground. They then need to be picked up and sorted from the empty pods. In
future I will stick to earlier maturing broad (fava) beans for a winter crop,
and irrigated maize for the summer, both crops being easy to hand harvest. I am
also trialling butter beans to see whether they might be a reasonable summer
protein crop.

I decided to make Mk3 of the seed drill.
Patrick made up precision sowing seed delivery plates (timber wheels with
grooves for picking up the seed) and these are driven by bicycle cogs and a
chain fixed to the spider wheels of the original version. It is very successful
and the broad bean drill will be completed on the same lines. Lack of rain from
mid-November last year meant I was unable to sow the planned crop for last
winter so switched to the Mk3 maize drill project. I am trialling three
varieties of F1 maize hybrids this year (not GM) and all are looking good at
this stage. I have a knapsack type sprayer and used a pre-emergence spray
against weeds, following up with a post-emergence where necessary. I am very
pleased with the results. Last year’s crop was swamped with Purslane (Portulaca)
and although I pulled as much of this as I could for goat feed it was a
losing battle.

In the garden, we had a good crop of Asparagus,
particularly from the varieties Connover’s Colossal and one of the Washingtons
– I cannot remember if it is Mary or Martha, having committed the sin of not
recording the variety when I sowed the seeds. Very bad management. I have tried
a couple of all-male hybrids in the past, in fact destroyed a bed this year,
and have not found them to be as productive as the old varieties. Kelvedon
Wonder peas, sown late winter, and Aquadulce beans also cropped well before
much insect trouble. The later peas and a second sowing of Aquadulce were badly
infested with insect larvae. Overwintered onions Despina and Long Red Florence
(aka Simiane) had a good survival rate and are being used now, although not yet
mature. Both are very mild varieties, which we prefer. When they are matured my
wife will chop them and bag up for the freezer – no storage losses that way and
they are ready to use in whatever quantity is required. My special Kelsae and
Globo onions are bigger than previous years at this stage, as are my leeks. I
grow these exhibition type vegetables purely for the fun of it, and eating of
course. Apricots fruited well too and my wife made jam and a thinner version
that goes exceptionally well on tiramisu ice-cream. We do have a sweet course
on rare occasions – and always a dry red with it.

Ever one to experiment with wines, a few weeks
ago I began adding a course of pâté between my main course and cheese. In the
past I have eaten pâté either as a starter, or after cheese. We found a good
rough chopped pork liver one and my wife has also developed one from minced
pork loin, adding garlic but still experimenting with other herbs. Pork loins
are extremely cheap here, about €4 per kg and some supermarkets will mince it
for you (much preferable to your run of the mill mince at about the same price)
so the home-made version is a long way cheaper than buying pâté. Making your
own from liver is very messy. Nice, but messy.I have had Moscatel with pâtés in recent years, but since this course is
now followed by cheese, with Port, and then nuts, with Moscatel, I began trying
different wines as I did not want to go from Moscatel to Port and back again. A
Sauternes or other sweet white would be fine, but I have settled for White
Port, preferring Ferreira’s (not the Lagrima, it is too sweet) to several
others I have tested.

I have received an email from Smashwords, the
ebook publisher, regarding ways and means of promoting ebooks. If you have
never tried one, this is a chance because some of the books published can be
free of charge from time to time, and this is one of them. Smashwords is
running a special promotion during the month of July. It will have a precise
start of 00.01 a.m. on 1st July and end at 11.59 p.m. on 31st
July, USA Pacific time – so ensure you purchase any books that are discounted
by the authors during that time. Smashwords publishes in many languages on a
great range of subjects and the site is worth looking at. You can link to this
promotion through www.smashwords.com/?ref=OldMcDonald
.To take advantage of the discounts
you will need to enter a Coupon Code towards the end of the purchase process.
This will vary according to the book or books you choose, but will be, for
example something like SSW50 – the Code for my book.